The U.S and China could kill two birds with one stone. Why not make a deal where the U.S drops Israel and China drops North Korea? Both could pretend they're giving something up so nobody loses face, both would save money and the whole world would be better off.

Once cut off from mommy and daddy, both Israel and NK would have to stop throwing tantrums, face reality, and deal with their problems. The rest of us could finally ignore them both and get on with more important things.

Interesting suggestion - Israel would have to give up all the occupied territories, sign the NPT, give up nuclear weapons and stop harassing Iran. Have you read the Russian and Chinese leadership's position on all these issues??

I don't have to read their position. Both China and Russia would in a blink opt for such a trade with the Americans.
The Palestinians would become irrelevant.
There would be no more need for Syria.
They would not be afraid of NATO and their allies.
And why would they defang a mega power positioned strategically in the belly of the Middle East and at the foot of Europe, Africa?
Stop harassing Iran? Iran would curl up and shut up to delight of one and all.
The more I think of it, I'm surprised the Israelis haven't thought of the same or have they?

Israel's immediate ballistic defence depends on a US-owned, Turkey based radar, and on a set of Spain-based, last-generation destroyers (for the record, Turkey and Spain both are NATO countries).

The offer to trade that protection for a potential alternative Russian- or Chinese-provided contraption seems interesting.

While the occasional bout of spontaneous narcisism may be understood, the idea of convincing sensible Israelis to dump the US for Russia/China, in order to better be able to carry on with their current treatment of Palestinias, however sounds a bit exotic.

But then again, one would think the mere prospect of receiveing anywhere near the BUSD 3 the US destines to Israel every year in military aid alone, should be enough to get every Palestinian soldier salivating.

Are you sure you insist that Israel is ready to give the proposed plan a go?

Israel's immediate ballistic defence depends on a US-owned, Turkey based radar, and on a set of Spain-based, last-generation destroyers (for the record, Turkey and Spain both are NATO countries).

The offer to trade that protection for a potential alternative Russian- or Chinese-provided contraption seems interesting.

While the occasional bout of spontaneous narcisism may be understood, the idea of convincing sensible Israelis to dump the US for Russia/China, in order to better be able to carry on with their current treatment of Palestinias, however sounds a bit exotic.

But then again, one would think the mere prospect of receiveing anywhere near the BUSD 3 the US destines to Israel every year in military aid alone, should be enough to get every Palestinian soldier salivating.

Are you sure you insist that Israel is ready to give the proposed plan a go?

I think you missed my point from which this thread came from.
I tried to point out that the affinity of the US and Israel is not one sided.

The Israeli lobby doesn't have to work hard to make sure that as an important ally it is also in the interest of the US that its ally remain in top form.

To highlight that point I suggested a hypothetical situation where Israel was in the Russian/Chinese camp.

What would be an advantage to the new ally and what kind of a loss to the old one.

Just to keep the scenario interesting ill respond to your points.

The Russian missile defence system promised but not delivered to Iran is the best in the world.
Syria has the prior version.(probably the one that brought down the Turkish fighter).

The ballistic defence system in Turkey is actually a joint Israeli and American venture, as is the Patriot and the new improved Israeli Iron dome system. So Israel is also an innovator of military technology.

Lastly, and not meant in a narcissistic way, the US can pump a lot of money and weapons into Palestine, they would have to use it effectively.

It would a good while before that would be a reality.

It would also mean that Russia / china also would have a port and a willing and able partner and ally in Israel, an Israel that is well seasoned and nuclear capable, at the foot of EU, at the side of Africa and entrenched firmly in the M.E.

I guess the CIA has discovered your line of thinking - they are happily "leaking" information about Mossad's "false flag operations".

Foreign Policy magazine (January 2012):

"Buried deep in the archives of America's intelligence services are a series of memos, written during the last years of President George W. Bush's administration, that describe how Israeli Mossad officers recruited operatives belonging to the terrorist group Jundallah by passing themselves off as American agents. According to two U.S. intelligence officials, the Israelis, flush with American dollars and toting U.S. passports, posed as CIA officers in recruiting Jundallah operatives -- what is commonly referred to as a "false flag" operation."

"Mossad has planted a few dozen agents in the CIA. Since they tend to be US nationals, they have managed to evade scrutiny. The Obama administration is deeply worried......."

"But while the memos show that the United States had barred even the most incidental contact with Jundallah, according to both intelligence officers, the same was not true for Israel's Mossad. The memos also detail CIA field reports saying that Israel's recruiting activities occurred under the nose of U.S. intelligence officers, most notably in London, the capital of one of Israel's ostensible allies, where Mossad officers posing as CIA operatives met with Jundallah officials."

"Interviews with six currently serving or recently retired intelligence officers over the last 18 months have helped to fill in the blanks of the Israeli false-flag operation. In addition to the two currently serving U.S. intelligence officers, the existence of the Israeli false-flag operation was confirmed to me by four retired intelligence officers who have served in the CIA or have monitored Israeli intelligence operations from senior positions inside the U.S. government."

Incidentally these "false flag" operations by Israel have been going on to the past few years - e.g., four Mossad agents were picked up by Pakistan's intelligence a few weeks ago - trying to cross the border into Iran - they were US-trained IT specialists. They confessed that their mission was to paralyze (government) computer networks. They were handed over to Iran - Russia has taken them for a "short trip" to Siberia.

European intelligence agencies have also alerted the USA about these "false flag operations" by Israel. As Foreign Policy reports:

"The issue has now returned to the spotlight with the string of assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists and has outraged serving and retired intelligence officers who fear that Israeli operations are endangering American lives.

"This certainly isn't the first time this has happened, though it's the worst case I've heard of," former Centcom chief and retired Gen. Joe Hoar said of the Israeli operation upon being informed of it. "But while false-flag operations are hardly new, they're extremely dangerous. You're basically using your friendship with an ally for your own purposes. Israel is playing with fire. It gets us involved in their covert war, whether we want to be involved or not."

The Israeli operation left a number of recently retired CIA officers sputtering in frustration. "It's going to be pretty hard for the U.S. to distance itself from an Israeli attack on Iran with this kind of thing going on," one of them told me."

Therefore, Mr/Ms Zbignew, your friends are hard at work to "provide an excuse for Israel and the US to attack." The key issue is: will the USA be baited by false information or does the USA have a moral (and ethical) backbone to make its own independent decisions??? We will find out during Obama's trip. In the meantime, back home in Washington, the thinking has changed after the military debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan. "It was a fundamental conviction of Bush and his top officials that the most powerful military on the planet could bring any state in the Greater Middle East to heel in a “cakewalk.” Today, in the wake of two failed wars on the Eurasian continent, a de-romanticized version of that conviction has become the deeply embedded. No American president in his second term (where legacy becomes a paramount issue) has ever committed American military power to an unattainable objective. Particularly when the difficult financial situation requires the complete goodwill of China, who has already warned the USA about the consequences of military intervention without the full approval of the UN."

Im really not famialiar with what you have written and more to the point your point is what?
That spy agencies use all kind of nasty tricks in their work. Even allies.
As it was famously so during the war between England and the US or other allies.
But Im still not sure what your comments ahve to do with a hypothetical situation I made up with the point that the Israeli/US alliance is one of mostly mutual intersts, if not everywhere than more so with each other than with Russia and China.
But now that you've got me thinking anything is possible.

What I wrote was that Mossad is created "false flag operations" to try and bait America into attacking Iran. However, several Mossad agents have been caught by the CIA, some have been caught by Pakistan (and handed over to China) and the European countries are on full alert for "false flag operations".

Following the recent election does, the President of Israel have to call on someone who can actually put a Cabinet together by the 19th March, so that people like President Carter alongside President Obama can engage it on the treatment of the Christian Palestinians, who after all look after the Holy sites, viz: Emporor Constantine's Church of the Holy Sepulchre & Lawrence's rescue of the Church of the Nativity now @ last a World Heritage site, for all of Christendom; which when last checked includes all American Chritians too!

There is no true, long term "two-state solution" because this story is not about two states.
There is a much bigger picture here in which the Palestinians especially, are playing to role of "cannon fodder", or the provoking stick.
Unless there is a comprehensive settlement of all the issues affecting and burning the Middle East, and as we can see day to day Israel might just be a fly on the windscreen in the potential all Arab nuclear war in between the Sunni and Shiite parts of Islam, how could an isolated, local peace accord achieve anything when it is not in the interest of any of the main players in or around the Middle East?
And the world is full of similar, seemingly local conflicts that could burst into wars.
Do we really think that North Korea is acting alone, with a mainly starving population with "second hand" missiles, and so on, "challenging the US"?
Only when the whole global world, especially the main power brokers are ready to create a peaceful, equal world for everybody, not only for their own self-benefit, that is when we will start seeing meaningful peace talks anywhere in the world.
Since our present socio-economic system, our present civilization is before an imminent collapse, we will see changes very soon, either towards a completely unpredictable, and violent transitional period, or towards true attempt to change humanity in a fundamental way, adapting it to the natural, global, mutually interdependent conditions of the 21st century.

I agree with what you say and in fact this addresses the notion that if Israel would only leave the occupation or even better if its population would move back to Poland and Morocco and Iraq then the world would be at peace.
And I also agree that there has to be a way addressing the issues AND resolving them.
That's a tall order for man kind even if best intentioned.
If you look at man's history it is nothing but a continuation of wars based on religion and nationalism, with its components of money and power.
So for the above stated reason I am pessimistic that such a global settlement will ever be reached and will opt out for your former end game rather than the later.

"Stronger restraint and control of the Palestinians" apparently means more slaughter of Palestinian civilians, more settlements and more support of settler violence, cracking down on peaceful protests by shooting unarmed demonstrators with live bullets, maintaining the siege and blockade on Gaza, and continuing to build the apartheid wall in the West Bank. While the Palestinian people are slowly losing their land and living for the 4th generation in poverty, politicians can gas about "peace" and "the peace process" until they turn blue, which is the whole point. Israel doesn't want peace, it wants land.

Cairo Mary, the reason Palestinians for the 4th generation are living in poverty, is that their Arab "brothers" have been using them as political pawns for the past 64 years in order to claim Championship of the poor Palestinians for their own ambitions to lead the Arab world. See Abdul Nasser, Assad, Saddam Hussein, and now Ahmedinejad! If they had done what Israel did with the Jews who were kicked out of the Arab countries, there would be no "refugee" problem.It is time Palestinian Arabs started dialogue with their Palestinian Cousins the Jews instead of their misguided hope that the Arab world will sort things out for them.

The whole issue well explained by guest-iosnile. The native Palestinians who were living on the land of Palestine for the last one thousand years, have been forced to leave and are living like refugees in other countries of the Middle East. Jews from all over the world have been facilitated to illegally occupy the land. Justice demands that the original natives should have the first right to live on the occupied land.

You must have just woken up from a long slumber.
There is virtually no one who says that Israel wants to hold on to all occupied territory.
If anything, Israel wants that the Palestinians should have the headache of governing themselves.
The point that you and everyone else who keeps on repeating that Israel should vacate occupied land is not contested.
The criticism of such a view is that it disregards why there is an occupation. If you jog your memory and you don't have to go back far, you'll remember that there were at least 3 wars and a good number lesser wars to dislodge the state of Israel.
It makes no difference what any charter says about occupation one country attacked so many times, and the 'game ain't over yet, is not going to 'reward' the insurgents by giving back land they took in battle...unless its for an exchange of a long lasting and realistic peace agreement.
That is the point of the occupation.
If Israel simply wanted more land it would have kept the Gaza and the Sinai.
As far as current condition, as I write, Hamas the defacto power of the Palestinians, are still insisting to liberate ALL of Palestine.
Does that sound like they want to let Israel stay where it is, whether in pre67 or for that matter 49 borders.
Why have you not considered this situation from that point of view.

What ARE you talking about. We are working on the assumption that Israel is getting 78% of the land. No Israeli leader has ever signed up to this; the Arabs have. One can only assume it is down to GREED that they want more - bearing in mind they turfed the original inhabitants out in the first place,

Let us talk of the Israelis giving up 3-5% of their 78% and wait for the howls of protest. It all comes down to GREED, GREED, GREED.

Don't get carried away. I said the 3% was a swap for an equal amount of Israeli territory.
And btw when did Hamas agree to making peace.
The Arabs agreed, you mean Abbas representing Fatah not the de facto power Hamas, with whom they don't have an agreement.do you know the difference between the two?
So make an agreement with whom?
And you are wrong again Barak offered Arafat this deal he refused.

Resolution 242 set the borders at the 1948 armistice line with minimal territorial adjustments to iron out anomalies. NO territorial gains despite the attempts of Zionists embedded in the US team crafting Resolution 242 to insinuate that 242 did not curb Israel’s further territorial designs.
The settlements are the most blatant evidence of those designs. The settlements are in flagrant violation of 242, indeed run a coach and horses through it. What more is there to talk about when it comes to Israel’s intentions?
The Israelis only accepted the 1947 Partition Plan because they calculated correctly that the Arabs would HAVE to reject it because it was so scandalously inequitable. Ben Gurion admitted as much. They could never have lived with the 52% of the territory it allocated to them. No better evidence is needed than the fact that when offered 78% in 1967 they only adhered to THEIR INTERPRETATION of the agreement.
And then they had the nerve in 2000 to turn round with a look of injured innocence to declare after seven years of procrastination during which they had doubled the number of settlers in the Occupied Territories which passed muster for the Oslo Peace Process that they had bent over backwards to offer 97% of the Occupied Territories (minus east Jerusalem which Israel had unilaterally annexed) and still the Palestinians weren’t satisfied. This wasn’t territory under 242 the Israelis had the right to negotiate. And if indeed Israel was being so ‘reasonable’ why wasn’t there an offer to give up 3% of their prime land on the table – west Jerusalem for Gaza for instance?
The Palestinians in the best traditions of the mafia were ‘given an offer they couldn’t refuse’. But they did and should continue to and all power to the resistance.
Israelis complain of threats to their legitimacy. What they adamantly ignore is the challenge their own refusal to abide by 242 poses to their own legitimacy. 242 gives them legitimacy within the 1967 borders. If they reject that in the belief that they can get more, then the Palestinians have rights on Israel proper. All bets are off.
The Zionists simply don’t know when they are well off; they push their luck as many examples in the Bible testify.
Just get normal you guys. There are other pebbles on the beach.

The Islamic Conference Organisation (which includes Iran) and the Arab League have unanimously and formally endorsed the Saudi Peace Plan based on Resolution 242. The plan has been on the table since 2002. What have we from the Israelis apart from increased settlement building?

If you build settlements you create enemies and the great con trick of the Zionists has been to conflate opposition to Israeli expansionism with anti Semitism.

As for Hamas it has every right to take its position as the PLO recognised Israel within its 1967 borders and Israel spat in the face of the Oslo agreement by continuing to build settlements.

As I have said, Israel is delegitimising itself by building settlements. Admit that settlement building is wrong and that they should be dismantled and one can begin to talk.

As for Hamas not recognising Israel, Israel has never recognised Palestine. Hamas has offered a 50 year hudna (truce). This is not the action of a movement bent on genocide. And why should it approve of Israel? Gandhi accepted the reality of Pakistan while disapproving of the principle of a divided Indian subcontinent. No one has accused him of being a war monger; though we learnt on the radio today that he seriously considered discarding passive resistance after the Amritsar massacre. Even the most peace loving people can be driven to violence. And the Israelis are past masters at goading to create the reaction that justifies their further expansion: classic wolves in sheep’s clothing.

I will admit that settlements are a bargaining point, like the Gaza and the Sinai.
Will you admit that there is no past or current state of Palestine.
Was there a monarch or President of Palestine previously or currently.
Is there curently a state of Palestine registered and acknowledged in the UN?
Why would Abbas have to ask the UN to recognize it as a state when it was always been a state?
And therefore, if borders havent been drawn, what should Israel recognize.
BTW there is no relationship in any form between Ghandi and his approach and Hamas.
Just the comparison alone implies that you have a different reality of what is on the ground.
Lastly, Look up what hudna means and in what context its used. You will understand better what Hamas means by a hudna. The meaning of hudna is not lost to Israelis either.

I despair. There wasn’t a Jewish state in Palestine before 1948 and they had to apply to the UN for admission. So what’s your point?

The whole point of 242 is that it was a comprehensive deal: land for peace. No bargaining chips for bits like Gaza and Sinai The deal was the bargaining chip not a platform for Israel to start trading bits of land for peace. The deal was the 1967 armistice line as the new border with minor modifications. Any other interpretation and you are going to rejoin with ‘The resolution only talks about lands not ‘the lands’. But there is a rider to it which forbids the acquisition of territory by war.

A ‘hudna’ means a truce and has a long pedigree in Islam. It is not something that is broken lightly

The reference to Gandhi is the fact that he recognised the reality of Pakistan without approving it, which is essentially Hamas’ position with Israel. And I mentioned that the Amritsar massacre almost made him give up non violence. The Palestinians have been put under impossible pressure by the Israeli occupation and although violent resistance is reprehensible it is certainly understandable as Gandhi himself said of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their homes. Peopled have th right of self defence, he said

The point you made was that Israel doesnt recognize the state of Palestine.

My reponse there is no state of Palestine as yet, and ther hasnt been one so far.

You mentioned that Hamas was willing to make a hudna.

I responded by suggesting to look into the historical context of a hudna.

You said that hudna- which means a ceasefire - has " a long pedigree..not easily broken".

So permit me to look for you.

Hudna does mean quiet or ceasefire but the historical context was refering to a war between Mohamed and the Qurayish tribe which, when seen by Mohamed was not going his way he declared a hudna. But the hudna as he explained was only so that he could regroup and defeat his enemy. Which he did.

This is especially a significant use of the word for Islamists like Hamas.

To you, it may mean how it translates. To those who understand the significance of the word in its proper context it means much more.

BTW the hudna offered was for 10 years and it was soon recinded.

As to your comparison of Ghandi to Hamas; Ghandi's philosophy was passive resistance.

Last time I looked at Hamas' charter it matched their actions...active resistance with the goal to liberate ALL of Palestine from top to bottom.

Lots of states do recognize Palestine; it would be nice if Israel and its american poodle would do likewise and then its other western lackeys might fall into line too.
I'm well aware of the derivation of the hudna but a 50 years truce allows a lot of time to sort things out.Even ten is better than nothing (it is 50). Anway Hamas only has traction because of the appalling way the israelis are treating the Palestinians.
Play fair instead of for ever trying to pull a fast one and youll get a positive response. But you have to admit the illegality of the settlements and prepare to withdraw from them to have anything to talk about. If that were to happen the peace deal to fall into place.
I will reiterate that Gandhi although himself a pacificst said the Palestinins had the right to use force to resist Israeli ethnic cleansing.

I think a one-state solution with all citizens being treated equally is a better solution than a two-state solution.

Continuing the current status quo is just going to leave Israel even more isolated - as even the Americans won't defend them - and they've already lost Europe and the rest of the world :(.

At the end of the day until Israel either gives the Palestinians a serious ~1967 deal no-one will blame them for rejecting it - especially while the death toll is out by a factor of 20 or so (according to Israeli government figures).

Poor "palestinians". It is difficult to understand how those Arabs managed to survive and lo and behold multiply from 350.000 to about 4.000.000. This must have been the Christian miracle of "multiplying the bread and wine" applied to Islamists. Fabulous!!!!

I didn't know that Israel was a Jewish state. I thought that it was a Zionist state and that Zionism was a secular movement. Regardless to make such a unified state work the US would simply have to go back into its history, remnants of which still show up today and suggest, as it did in its own political system that Palestinians be considered only 20% of a Hebrew/Jewish resident.

At the rate the Arabs multiply a one state solution would wind up inundating the Israeli population in a few generations. They know that and they'd never agree to a one state deal. They need to get a peace deal done and put a line in the sand - cross it with feet, tanks, rockets, etc. and you will be obliterated - one and all.

"I didn't know that Israel was a Jewish state. I thought that it was a Zionist state"
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I don't care enough to acknowledge the difference, really. But regardless, Israel is DEFINITELY run by Jewish theocrats now.

A majority of American families believe in God and attend church regularly. Most belong to the Christian faith in which the Bible is the word of God. That is the basis of the majority belief in supporting the state of Israel, particularly remembering the Holocaust perpetrated by the German Nazi party against European Jewry during the Second World War .

However, there is now a very serious contention that American sympathy and support for Israel has been subverted by a powerful gang of lobbyists pushing a political agenda that exists to demonise the largest indigenous people of the former land of Palestine, the essentially peaceful Muslim Arabs, who have lived on the land continuously for over one thousand years - a millennium in which there was only ever a minority Jewish presence.

In the 65 years since the then newly-formed United Nations voted for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, Israel has become the only undeclared nuclear state and arguably now the most powerful in the world after the US and Russia. Chillingly, however, the Israeli government refuses to sign the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) or to subject its huge, secret nuclear arsenal to the inspection of the IAEA.

Notwithstanding its success in the export of military equipment, diamonds, pharmaceuticals and chemicals to both the EU and the US, it still receives many billions of dollars every year at the demand of the influential American Israel lobby that is now the loudest unelected voice in American politics. The reasoning for this transfer of American tax dollars to a foreign state whose standard of living is already higher than that of most Americans, is largely unexplained.

What we do know is that the Israel lobby ensures that no US Member of Congress is elected to that position unless they commit to supporting its anti-Arab, pro-settlement, political agenda. This is in stark contrast to the European Union representing half a billion people in 27 member states that condemns Israel's illegal settlements outright and demands human and civil rights for all.

The end result is that five million Muslim Arabs have now been dispossessed of their lands, homes and businesses by the occupying force of the Israeli army under the pretence of 'state security'. Furthermore, Israel has now induced over half a million of its citizens to leave their homes to illegally settle on occupied Arab land in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. This is a deliberate policy to ethnically cleanse the entire land of former Palestine, of all Muslims (and Christians).

The question is, why would Christian, or Jewish, American families support such an inhuman, illegitimate and immoral policy? Ever since Zionist militants from the terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi, bombed the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 British and Arab civilians, it appears that Israeli militants are allowed to assassinate, with impunity, their opponents anywhere in the world - even on the high seas in international waters or in hotels in neutral countries.

Yet both Christian and Jewish Americans apparently still authorise unlimited support for the Israeli government notwithstanding that these policies will almost certainly lead to a new Middle East war that could escalate into a nuclear conflict and the suspension of oil supplies through the Strait of Hormuz with a consequent doubling of energy costs internationally and the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs worldwide, including the US.

It is a disaster waiting to happen as a demanding, Israeli prime minister struts and frets his hour upon the stage, funded and financed by a subservient and subordinate, US Congress whilst thousands of unemployed and homeless Americans stand in line at soup kitchens in California, New Jersey and Nevada, as their representatives vote yet more money overseas.

Is this the meaning of 'democracy' in 21st Century America and, if so, perhaps President Obama should fix his own house first.

to guest-josnnle. It's not so easy as you state. Israel has no choice but defend herself. Look at the Hamas or even PLO charter. They are both poised to annihilate Israel. There was no any occupation before 1967, but the Arab states had the same strategy to wipe Israel off the map. Peace is in the hands of Arabs. As soon as they accept the right of Israel to be a Jewish state, and reject violence as the means of negotiations, the MidEast conflict will be solved. The problem of current borders, as well as the status of Jerusalem and other problems will be determined through negotiations. Had Arafat not resorted to violence during his negotiations with Barak in 2000 in Camp David, peace would have been reached a decade ago.

Typical oversimplification of a complex problem which has gotten the better of a number of presidents and and heads of state not for a lack of trying.
It is obvious that should the problem be as clearly and so obviously, one sided as you put it, it would have been dealt with many years ago.
For example it's not only strong political lobbying that keeps Israel as a staunch American ally.
There are converging interests from a foreign policy perspective.
Culturally and politically, a secular Israel and a democratic Israel has far more of an affinity with the U.S. than 'democratic' Egypt, Lybia, Tunisia, Pakistan, Iran and certainly Gaza or the West Bank of Palestine.
It is also misleading and grossly oversimplifying to state that because Israel gets billions in loans and grants it is the reason why Americans are standing in line at the soup kitchens, implying that if it wouldn't be for the 4-6 billion dollars given to Israel as aid (of which at least a good part has to be paid back, and is done so) there would be chicken in every pot, and there would be no more poor in the US.
I urge you to check how much money the US allocates world wide and what percentage of that goes to Israel.
As to your question as to why an overwhelming American Christians and American Jews support the Jewish homeland of Israel and don't, like you, share the sentiment that Jews have no historical or moral right to be in the land that was sanctioned by virtually every country in the UN save for the Muslim countries, is because they are of the conviction that the people of Israel have a right to their homeland no less and at least as much as the Palestinians living there 'only' a thousand years.
Is there room for negotiating? Is there foot dragging and grandstanding on both sides? Are both parties at fault at not being too entrenched in their positions? Should the US push harder the both sides to negotiate in earnest?
Absolutetely!
But, by you oversimplifying the whole scene and conviniently dropping the fault at the doorstep of only one of the parties implies that either you don't understand both sides or don't care to understand, a stance common to a lot of similar thinking individuals.

to Erasehead. According to Zahbia Yusuf(http://www.bitterlemons-international.org/previous.php?opt=1&id=199) "Jews settled in Palestine because they see it as the Land of Israel. They have preexisting religious, historical and national ties and rights to the land that have been acknowledged by the international community and confirmed in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the British Mandate of Palestine of 1922, and the United Nations partition resolution of 1947. Jews cannot withdraw from Israel because this is the only Jewish state in existence, whereas the British withdrew from Ireland and can withdraw from Ulster and still keep intact their national state of Great Britain. Unlike Ulster, Israel is not a colonial state. Jews are, therefore, not inferior to the Palestinians in their claims to statehood in part of the shared area".

Israel indeed has no choice but to defend itself. But are their policies an effectivce way to accomplish that? On the evidence, what they have been doing, for this last Israeli administration especially, is seriously counterproductive.
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In fact, there is no obvious way this ends at all well for Israel. At least not without a serious rethink of how they are going to deal with the Palestinians. And with the settler movement.

And with regards to having their own state - well the Jews are only the sixth largest religion - neither the Hindus or the Sikhs have their own state, only one state is Buddhist. Even the largest religion - Christianity - only has a tiny handful of Christian states. And even most of them are either multi-cultural or they are city states.

"land that was sanctioned by virtually every country in the UN save for the Muslim countries"

Regrettably rubbish! The UN resolution was carried by just 33 votes out of a present day total of over 180! In other words, a SMALL MINORITY of the present day international community voted for an Israeli state in Palestine. (Britain, of course, abstained).

Wikipedia says the General Assembly voted 37 for; 12 agains; 9 abstentions.
That's more than 2/3 majority. What relevance does current number states have to 1949.
Regrettably the rubbish is yours.
More important if the Palestinians would have not rejected and continue to have rejected the UN 's mandate, there would be a different Palestine.

Pretty clearly, since Israel wants to remain a Jewish state, they are going to have to pull the settlers out of the West Bank. (Otherwise, they are left with either 1) being a minority, 2) running an aparteid state, or 3) doing major ethnic cleansing. None of which are viable, workable, realistic, or practical.)
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Once they do that, there is some prospect for settling exactly where the border is. A few land swaps from the 1967 border -- which will doubtless be contentious, but are quite possible. Probably with some kind of monetary compensation in lieu of the "right of return." But then, those Palestinians who actually lived in what is now Israel (and therefore might arguably have some attackment to actual bits of land pre-1949) are aging out of the population.
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Once you have the two populations separated, you can always put up a wall until you decide that you can get along. Which, memories being as long as they seem to be in that part of the world, may take a couple of times longer than in, for example, the Balkins. But even before it does, it seems like a viable, workable, and realistic option.
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The only issue at that point comes down to private cross-border attacks. (Which, of course, we have now anyway.) But a recognized Palestinian state has a lot more incentive than the current kludge to actually get that under control. And, at worst, Israel is pretty much where they are now on that. While having a lot of other issues reduced to minor, or at least readily manageable, levels.

So basically what you are saying to Israel, give up the occupied part, give it to the Palestinians. pay money in lieu of the right to return and if even after that they don't behave you have the right to do what you feel is correct.
Am I right?
Well your suggestion has been on the table for a long time.
And it seems practical enough.
There is just one problem..Hamas, the defacto, power of the Palestinians still want to liberate all of Palestine.
Where does that leave the state of Israel?

Do you see any other solution to Hamas? Because getting a Palestinian state going would at least give Fatah something to point to. And strengthening the other Palestinian players is a necessary part of any real way to marginalize Hamas that I can see.

I would have thought Hamas would give that up in exchange for peace - or at least would agree to only go about it through peaceful means - as in Northern Ireland.
If Hamas didn't agree then they'd be likely to become very isolated.

"the essentially peaceful Muslim Arabs"
As you can see right now in Syria.

"In the 65 years since the then newly-formed United Nations voted for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, "
Please allow me to correct you:
In the 65 years since the then newly-formed United Nations voted for the establishment of a Jewish state AND an Arab state in Palestine...
Guess who didn't accept the UN resolution

At the moment Hamas is just recovering from another 'victory' against Israel. They feel they have been empowered because they were able to land a rocket near Tel Aviv. This to them is a major victory.
The victory is enhanced and their position is entrenched when good people like yoursel give them hope and relevance both by legitimizing their position(and you never make difference between Abbas or Haniye to you they are one and the same) and then censuring Israel for responding to being shelled by Hamas and their terrorist allies.

The Israeli tactic has been and will continue to be that it will be painful to pursue a policy that advocates the destruction of Israel or as they put it 'the liberation of ALL of Palestine'.
Are you not bothered by the fact that Hamas and Fatah can't join forces.
Are you not bothered by the fact that Egypt has not given Hamas unlimited backing or even opened unfettered their side of the border.
Are you not wondering that other Arab countries have not rushed to the Palestinians with offers of money and weapons..other than the other pariahs like Iran and their proxy Hezbollah?
If people would look at Hamas for what they are and see their position from the eyes of those closer to them, like Fatah, like Israel, like Jordan and Egypt they would have a different approach.
Ponder that.

Isolated? They are isolated by the rest of the Palestinians - Fatah, and Egypt, Jordan, Saudi.

The only ones not isolating them from their position are those like yourself and those that blindly criticize Israel for their actions without critically evaluating the whole scene and analyzing the various positions and Iran and Hezbollah.

Don't just superficially give it a glance and say ..hey this is terrible.but critically analyzing why Israel doesn't offer a peaceful solution if at least an important part of the other side still wants to destroy them.
So your assumption is wrong about Hamas wanting to make peace. They will consider what they call a 'hudna' which is an Islamic term that loosely translates into a cease fire.
And if you understand the historical and quoranic context it refers to a temporary peace that Mohamed offered to one of his opponents until he regrouped and was victorious.
Educate yourself so that your input will be meaningful and relevant.

You and people like you strengthen Hamas' position and encourages them to continue in their path while you absolve them and condemn Israel for resisting them.

Obviously I need to work harder on my clarity.
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My entire point was that a) there is a difference between Hamas and Fatah, and b) the only way to a viable solution include Hamas being forced into irrelevance. (Or, I suppose, Hamas changing its character entirely. Unlikely as that seems.) In short, hamas as it is has to go; nothing else works -- so the question is how to get there.
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But Israel's current policy does not appear to be doing anything that really hurts Hamas. Yes, they get shot up occasionally. But they also get a steady stream of recruits, who are unhappy that Fatah isn't getting anything out of Israel but pain either . . . and at least with Hamas they can delude themselves that they are doing something effective.

So basically you're implying that Hamas is interested in peace based on pre67 borders. Is that correct ?
Now go and read their charter and mission statement because its clear that you are unfamiliar with it.
Btw, what IS sad as mentioned before that many like yourself ascribe to 'Israelis' characteristics and attributes which have no base in reality, such that Israel has no desire to make peace and would rather live in perpetual state of war all so that they can rule over all of Palestine.
Please quote me the source of that statement from a current leader.

So why is Israel not talking to those people right now? And why aren't they calling Hamas' bluff over the pre67 borders?

Seriously negotiating pre67 with any and all parties at a ceasefire for force Hamas to show their cards - and if they said 'fuck off' to peace then the pressure on them would increase as no-one could claim they were serious about peace.

You misapprehend the moral behind the rocket and one Palestinians have learned: that one rocket landing close to Jerusalem achieved more concessions on making life easier in Gaza than all the talking ‘till the conversion of the Jews’, pace Andrew Marvell.
The Israeli political establishment are bullies.

Hi,
Barack Obama's Israel trip. Hope not yet lost, but close. On the Cape of lost hope not much can be expected as Mr. Obama and Mr. Netanyahu dislike each other intensively. Mr. Obama’s only options is to turn the screw on economically.

And then what? Obama then by recognizing and defining the Palestinian borders would have forced Hamas to recognize the other part of the land called the state of Israel.
I think he should go for it.
Then the Palestinians can continue to focus on fighting each other and leave the Israelis to prosper.

In all the discussions, debates and mutual accusations, one key fact stands out and is, finally, being taken into account by outside observers, including in this fine article. Namely, Israel is progressively gaining more and more control over more and more land which does not belong to it. Whatever the historical "rights" and the number of rockets fired, the bottom line is that Israel is not so much consistently "dismantling the terrorist infractructure" as constructing settlements on Arab land, a process of expansion which has never stopped, hardly ever slowed. To this extent, the intifada, terrorist attacks and rockets are, in fact, convenient to Israel because they serve as the foundation for its expansion, a justification of sorts and a "cover." This is like someone shooting at my house while I go over and rape their wife and set up my cousin to live in their bedroom. In a conflict such as this, the crucial point is -- whose jackboots are treading on whose ground and, in particular, whose settlers are conducting a "stealth" operation of ethnic cleansing. In this context, talk or even hopes of a "two-state" solution is ludicrous, so long as the United States continues to unquestionably support Israel.

Since the annexation of East Jerusalem there have been several points in history where a two state solution appeared to be in the offering. In those moments, there was a dramatic increase of East Jerusalemites who filed applications for Israeli citizenship. Polls among Palestinian Westbank and Gaza residents point in a similar direction, that most would prefer to have citizenship of Israel on their undivided historic homeland of Palestine.
The PA government, which former Israeli foreign Minister Shlomo Ben Ami described as a form of outsourced administration of the occupying power, draws its legitimacy from the vision of a two state solution. PA officials won't give up their stakes and privileges, regardless what the population wants.

Israels economic and political interest is to maintain the status quo as long as possible. It can't get much better, from Israels perspective: It has full control and economic benefits from the parts of the territories that it finds attractive (C-Areas: 60% of West Bank land, 80% of its Water resources, Dead Sea Minerals and Tourism, Stone and Marble Mining, etc.), while the Palestinian urbanizations are self-administered and kept fat and lazy with the world's largest per-capita foreign development aid.

That explains how ridiculous it is to call for negotiations -- I am dead sure Israel would pose conditions impossible to fulfil for the Palestinian negotiation side.

Instead, after 45 years of Israel creating facts on the ground for a one-state-solution, it is time the international community reminds Israel of its responsibility that it is assuming with its one-state approach: It needs to give all residents full citizenship. The ever-growing BDS campaign does not demand necessarily a state for Palestinians. It demands equal rights, and an end to the de-facto apartheid situation, under whatever, one or two state scenarios. Israel is the only sovereign between the Mediterranean and the Jordan river. It is time for pushing Israel towards a decision between one state or two states along 1967 borders. Withdrawing its illegal settlement population back into Israel is a costly and painful procedure, but the alternative of perpetuating apartheid needs to be more costly and painful in order to give Israel an incentive to move ahead.

Isn't it clear to you by now that a one state solution means that Israelis may be governed potentially by Palestinians and potentially (although less so) Palestinians by Israelis.
Neither one would look forward to that scenario.
The 2 state solution is the best approach and that small sliver of land has to be sliced just right like an expensive piece of cake and shared between two very hungry parties. Every crumb matters.
One thing is certain, one will come away with a better deal. They both know it.
It's just that neither of them want to be that one.
And you are 100% right. The purpose of the settlements is to creat facts on ground. That is part of the jostling for position.
So if you are correct, the Us should push the Palestinians more so that there will be more to negotiate with less facts on the negotiating table.

There is only one sovereign between Mediterranean and Jordan: Israel. In the past 45 years Israel has decided to make two states impossible (forget about rhetoric, what matters are the decisions cast in concrete). There was no Israeli government since then who was able or willing to revert the trend of settlements. I interpret this as Israels decision for a one-state solution, giving Palestinian residents the long term perspective of being stateless, crammed in the Gaza and West Bank urbanizations (A-Areas), living in conditions well comparable with apartheid or colonialization. That's the scenario without foreign intervention, (or with repeated calls for peace talks, keeping the dead idea of a two state solution alive).

The only way to prevent this scenario is to exert strong pressure on Israel, to make it economically less attractive to continue its occupation and gradual de-facto annexation, and de-populating (some say ethnic cleansing) of the juicy parts of West Bank. Relocating one settler back into Israel may cost as much as 200.000$, considering compensation with expensive Israel land and housing, and the force you may need to relocate heavily armed dogmatic lunatics. With half a million settlers, that sums up to 100 billion $. Imagine what economic sanctions (justified along the lines of apartheid south africa) you need, in combination with some rewards for progress, to make that two-state scenario attractive for Israel.

You are so sure that Israel wants a single state so that it specifically can keep the Palestinians penned up indefinitely in Gaza and Section A.
Either you have zero understanding of the situation or you are deliberately being provocative and baiting.
Do you think for one single second that Israel would permanently want to assume governance over the Palestinians who have a great deal of difficulty governing themselves.

They don't want to lord over them and vice versa.

What the Israelis do want is to use the occupied territories as a bargaining chip to creat the best settlement with the Palestinians as possible, meaning, land for peace and as secure as possible.
And as already indicated there would a swap for some of area E for some parts of Israel so that it will have a militarily more defensible position.

This was the strategy with returning the Siniai to Egypt which resulted in a peace treaty.

In reality this has been offered to the Palestinians before as about 97% of what they wanted at Oslo. Arafat turned it down.
While it appears that Abbas is ready to deal but Hamas who are the de facto power of the Palestinians, are not ready, as they say not today and not tomorrow..never.

Netanyahu, by keeping the status quo, is looking to make a deal.

After the land for peace agreement the settlers and the compensation for those with the right to return is a matter of money.
And if money can solve the rest it is a far easier way than to continue to fight.
Because it should be crystal clear to the Palestinians by now they will not solve their problem by forcefully 'taking back' Palestine.
The rest of your posturing of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, racism is part of the other war the war of words.

I'm not sure that I believe a two state solution is possible or even if it would bring any sort of lasting peace, at this point its maybe better to give the Israeli hard-right their 'greater Israel' and let them take over Palestine, then we can have honest discussion about rights for citizens of Israel, because as things are these half-states that exist in lew of Palestine are never going to be stable entities, with real economies. If all the citizens of that area (whether it's called greater Israel or something else) are under the single government then the responsibility to respect citizens would come to the fore and it would look more like the apartheid situation, the status quo allows both sides let their humanitarian/governmental responsibilities slide.

When you're God's Chosen People you have a divine right to ethnically cleanse, collectively punish, summarily execute, pursue lebensraum, wantonly smite civilian populations and all sorts of similar activities which would be regarded as human rights violations if mere mortals were to engage in them.

Well said. The interesting fact is that while apartheid is being practiced by the expansionist regime, the targets are genetically brothers. the Jews and the Palestinians have the same genes. "According to medical research, they (i.e., the Palestinians) have the same genes as the Jews. "High-resolution Y chromosome haplotype analysis was performed in 143 paternally unrelated Israeli and Palestinian Moslem Arabs (I&P Arabs) by screening for 11 binary polymorphisms and six microsatellite loci. Two frequent haplotypes were found among the 83 detected: the modal haplotype of the I&P Arabs (∼14%) was spread throughout the region, while its one-step microsatellite neighbor, the modal haplotype of the Galilee sample (∼8%), was mainly restricted to the north. Geographic substructuring within the Arabs was observed in the highlands of Samaria and Judea. Y chromosome variation in the I&P Arabs was compared to that of Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews, and to that of North Welsh individuals. At the haplogroup level, defined by the binary polymorphisms only, the Y chromosome distribution in Arabs and Jews was similar but not identical. At the haplotype level, determined by both binary and microsatellite markers, a more detailed pattern was observed. Single-step microsatellite networks of Arab and Jewish haplotypes revealed a common pool for a large portion of Y chromosomes, suggesting a relatively recent common ancestry. The two modal haplotypes in the I&P Arabs were closely related to the most frequent haplotype of Jews (the Cohen modal haplotype)" - American Scientific Journal. Same genes - what is all this fuss about??

If anyone is bedfellows with Karl Marx it's the U.S. which deliberately planted Gulagtanamo on the soil of one of the last vestiges of Stalinism on earth in order to avoid the complications of dealing with a free, democratic legal system.

True, true... and who if not the 'progressives', the ideological heirs of Uncle Joe, love to make the biggest fuss about it. They obviously don't like the hapless amateurs' intrusion into the only field they have ever showed any professionalism, eh?

of course. Present day palestinians, that is, those of them who didn´t arrive from neighbouring countries enticed at the offers of jobs, are former jews who never left the land after the roman conquest that were forcefully converted on fear of being massacred. After several generations passed,their descendants forgot their former faith and the impossed way they were forced to became muslim. Same for the spaniards.

Facts are facts. While Israeli leaders had offered the Palestinians many proposals to PLO to settle the dispute - as objective as may be to the Pals.

Except, for the Palestinians consistent demand of flooding Israel with their citizens, and surrender of old Jerusalem - Jews holiest site, to which, Israel can not accept, Palestinians never proposed any plan of their own, which even the most left wing Israeli leader could find acceptable.

Jerusalem is also holy to Christianity and Islam.
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How about we just take Jerusalem away from Israel and declare it a Christian city, kick all the Jewish folk out?
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It's not like they could stop us. Israel is basically an irrelevant backwater compared to the real powers of he world.

"Israel is basically an irrelevant backwater compared to the real powers of he world."
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Really!!!!!!
If Israel is a "irrelevant backwater" country. one wonders what would you call these Arab & Islamic countries in the region

As for Jerusalem?.
Jews had built it, their prophets (including Jesus himself who was a Jew), had lived, preached and even died in that city. It is indeed holy city to Jews and Christians.
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As for Muslims. That claim (of holly to Muslim), hardly justified.
a. Muslims came as conquerers - not as builders.
b. Mohammad never set foot in that city. Seeing it only in his dream, is not as living, praying in that place.
c. The only reason it became as their 3rd holiest site - to prevent Jews from claiming it back and rebuilt their 3rd temple there.
e. Jerusalem is mentioned in the Old Testament no less then 700 times. Never mentioned in the whole Quran.
f. The only time this city has been at peace - when Jews had ruled and manged it to were it is today.

Melissia you may not be aware but Judaism, the progenitor of both Christianity and Islam, has its historical connection to Jerusalem dating back for almost 4 thousand years. We don't lay claim to either the Vatican or Mecca.
We acknowledge and respect the Christian and Muslim holy places.
We don't agree that the city be under non Israeli rule. We have been there before.

"Really!!!!!!"
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Yes. Israel is not really all that important. For the US, more important allies and partners are all of Europe, the UK, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, China... just about every country in the world that isn't third world is more important to the US, economically, than Israel.

OMG Melissa,
Just relax lady, you seem to be a bit hyperventilating. No need to get hot and heavy. These countries which you have listed above - they are not located in all-important strategic region of ME & Gulf.

With your ill informed posts, it is hard to believe we are communicating a rational and level headed level.

Perhaps, you should listen more carefully CEOs of most respected American companies (Google, IBM, Motorola), as why they decided to locate their R&D department in Israel, and not in any other neighboring Arab states.

Or read more about the massive technological development coming from Israel, then you will understand the power of knowledge - knowledge is power. Israel generates lot of it.

At last a sensible summary of the Israeli-Palestinian situation from TE. The Palestinians have lost. It does not matter whether it's due to the lack of willingness to compromise, the failure of leadership or too many cooks in the Arab kitchen. By aligning its cause with those who threatened Israel with annihilation and continuing to deny its right to exist as a Jewish state they managed to galvanize the energies of already paranoid and deeply wounded people through presenting them with a existential question: to be or not to be. Ironically, the EU's position of encouraging Palestinian demands such as partition of Jerusalem and the right of return while refusing to press for compromise and limiting the extent of their demands only served to make the Palestinian position that much worse.

So what is the future? The best bet for the Palestinians is to develop themselves while waiting for the Jordanian monarchy and Bedouin elite to disappear, making a truly viable Palestinian state possible. Waiting for Israel to disappear is not an option anymore.

Would the writer of this piece care to expand a little bit by offering a Palestinian's point of view in the second-to-last paragraph? No? Palestinian voters don't exist or something? Or they are just far too Other to be mentioned? WTF? The Israel-centrism of this is amazing.

And in my opinion, what Israeli citizens should be worrying about today is not how to secure the country's well-being, but whether the country is worth the bother. Seriously. Ethnic nationalism is so 20th century, and the rest of the world hardly takes it seriously as a concept anymore.

Particularly when it leads to barbaric abominations like the situation in the occupied territories.

Before start extolling the virtues of a secular state ask the Palestinians whether they want to live in a secular state, with religious freedom for all or no religion. With no discrimination of sexes. With freedom from homophobia and homophobic persecution.
With common and civil law based not on Sharia law.
From what one sees in Palestine (or for that matter most Muslim countries) there isn't going to be an Muslim secular country ever.
Where as in Israel, while not fully secular, is closer to it than their Muslim counter parts. Just look at the political parties in Israel.
So if you prefer a secular state, ask all the parties involved if they prefer what you prefer.

Before start extolling the virtues of a secular state ask the Palestinians whether they want to live in a secular state, with religious freedom for all or no religion. With no discrimination of sexes. With freedom from homophobia and homophobic persecution.
With common and civil law based not on Sharia law.
From what one sees in Palestine (or for that matter most Muslim countries) there isn't going to be an Muslim secular country ever.
Where as in Israel, while not fully secular, is closer to it than their Muslim counter parts. Just look at the political parties in Israel.
So if you prefer a secular state, ask all the parties involved if they prefer what you prefer.